This invention pertains to a method of conducting x-ray lithography and in particular, to the method of improving x-ray lithography in the sub 100 nm range to create high quality semiconductor devices for use in the manufacturing of commercial and military semiconductor devices used in phased array radar, missile seeking devices direct broadcast satellite television receivers, wide band wireless systems, global positioning satellite receivers and cellular telephones, and other equipment.
Current systems on the market today use x-ray or optical lithography to transfer a pattern from a mask to a wafer in a parallel method. The pattern is transferred from mask to wafer much faster than the serial writing of e-beam. The benefits of x-ray lithography range from a factor of 5 to about a factor of 600. Mix and match is the key to cost effective production, where most of the levels are defined by optical lithography and the critical levels are patterned using x-ray lithography. The benefits of using x-ray lithography for critical levels provide the means to ramp up production of semiconductor devices to meet not only defense requirements, but the emerging commercial requirements as well. What is needed is a new generation x-ray lithography stepper designed specifically to be integrated to an x-ray point source with an x-ray point source with the eventual addition of a collimator to further resolve features below 100 nm. It is also necessary to automate wafer and mask handling.
Clearly, it is desirable for this method to be very adaptable. At the same time, the method should be cost effective. It is the object of this invention to set forth a method of improving x-ray lithography in the sub 100 nm range to create high quality semiconductor devices which avoid the disadvantages, previously mentioned limitations of typical methods of production of current semiconductor devices.